"It is time to close the gate."
Translation:È ora di chiudere il cancello.
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Can someone please explain if there's a specific time to put an article like "di" in front of infinitives I have yet to find a method to this madness. Per Favore
I would also like to know this. And also, which article do we need, "di," "a," "per"?
Agreed. There is simply no teaching, is there? It is so frustrating, and a waste of valuable time.
Not only is there no germane info about prepositions here, this unit is for learning about infinitives not prepositions. Yet this exercise is all about prepositions.
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I am still hoping someone will explain when to use "di" or "per" or "a" before an infinitive. Does anybody know if there is a rule or if it is idiomatic?
It's to do with what verb is used to introduce the infinitive. I think you do have to learn it case-by-case - here are some links to help:
https://www.duolingo.com/comment/6060401 http://italian.about.com/od/verbs/a/aa031908a.htm
I learned more in 10 minutes from those links than I have done in ten days on Duolingo! Thanks
So here we have a sentence that, if you were to try and translate literally, would say, "It is time OF to close the gate." For me, as a memory tool, this works because it is relatable to "time of day," "time of life," "time of the morning," etc... But recalling another sentence in this exercise, if I were to say, "You are too young to close the gate." would the "di" change to "per?" I believe the question I'm asking is, does the preposition depend upon what precedes it and not the verb that follows?
È il tempo di chiudere il cancello. Marked wrong. I guess "il tempo" is not grammatically correct. Any native Italian speakers input appreciated!
In some sentences before it uses da as to then here it uses di as to sometimes a and per so?!!!!!
Whether to use di, a, da or per where the English has "to" followed by an infinitive depends on what precedes that infinitive, and on how that infinitive is used. It does not in general depend on which infinitive it is.
There are some general guidelines, but there are many exceptions. per is generally used where the sense is "in order to" (ie carry out the infinitive, eg mi sono fermato per fumare = "I stopped for a smoke"). da is often used where the sense is something like "for the purpose of" (+ Infinitive) eg troppo piccolo da leggere = "too small to read")
di and a (which together make up the majority of cases) are less easily categorised eg when you start doing something you cominciare/iniziare a + Inf, but when you stop or finish doing it you smettere/finire di + Inf. You just have to get used to these.
Modal verbs (like volere, dovere, sapere) and impersonal constructions usually omit any preposition (eg è difficile capire = "it is difficult to understand"), but the present sentence provides a salutary exception (è ora di fare qualcosa = "it is time to do something"). Basically the moral is: expect the unexpected.
duolingo's idiosyncrasies has made learning a language more frustrating than productive
For those, like me, that is struggling with a, da, per before infinitives this might help get some kind of a grip : https://www.thoughtco.com/italian-verbs-and-prepositions-2011671
Extremely frustrating! I write down the supposedly correct answer & the next time the same sentence appears, they change the article used!!!!
Can someone explain when is correct "a chiudere" and when "di chiudere"?
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that doesn't depend on the verb "chiudere" but on the verb or expression that you have before it. so, you don't have to learn if it's with or without "di", you have to learn which verbs or words need "di" after them, not only with "chiudere", but with the other similar verbs, too.
for example "bisogna" (impersonal) needs no "di" and it will be: bisogna chiudere la porta. but, "abbiamo bisogno" needs "di" and it will be: abbiamo bisogno di chiudere la porta (we need to close the door). the verb "aspettare" needs "a", so, the order to wait instead of closing it immediately will be: aspetta a chiudere la porta. and so on...
Thanks:) Do you know any site/on-line tutorial, where these verbs and their verses are listed? At least the most important. Duolingo not so helpful about it
If you google eg "italian verbs with prepositions" you should find lots of sites with this information. For example https://learnamo.com/en/verbs-prepositions-italian/.
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yes, the best way is to google it, maybe in your language ;)
ex.: https://www.thoughtco.com/italian-verbs-and-prepositions-2011671, https://www.easitalian.com/blog/italian-verbs-with-prepositions/, https://grammar.collinsdictionary.com/italian-easy-learning/prepositions-after-verbs in English or http://grammatica.impariamoitaliano.com/2014/06/verbi-e-preposizioni.html in Italian
See eg my reply to a poster named shit.... just above. The short answer is that there is unfortunately no straightforward reliable rule on this.
I wrote: Il tempo per chiudere il cancello. Why is this not acceptable?
First, you have no verb.
Secondly, il tempo (besides meaning weather, and (grammatical) tense!) is time in the abstract, or a length of time (a time period). For an instant of time or the time of day (in the sense in which "What is the time?" is Che ora è?/Che ore sono?) ora is used.
Thirdly, the preposition to use with ora to indicate the time TO do something is di.
Thus È ora di... is the standard expression for "It is time to..." (and indeed even "it is time for...": È ora di cena = It's time for dinner, È ora di pranzo = It's time for lunch)
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Even more... I think. It's not exactly as "E' ora di cena", just because it's 20 o'clock, but it can also express the need to do something: "We have to go, so it's the last moment to close the gate" [or] "We must close the gate, otherwise somebody could come in and steal something" or "We will do it, if you want it or not", like in "E' ora di finire con questo argomento!", it means that you don't want to speak about it any more.
In following an example from before, I wrote "E' arrivato il tempo di chiudere il cancello" and was marked wrong. Va bene, but I was wondering if my translation would work in speech in Italy.
I don't believe so. "fermare" is to 'close' in the sense of bringing something to an end, while "chiudere" is to close in the sense of shutting something.
Every verb has its own preposition. When you learn a verb you can also learn its preposition. Usually you can tell by its category.
That might be misleading. The verb determines which preposition follows it, not which preposition precedes it. But here "di" does not follow any verb. The correct explanation is simply that "È ora di" (followed by an Infinitive) is the correct expression for "it is time to..."